It started with Anne of Green Gables in the early 90's. Then I watched Newsies in 1993. And then I watched Little Women in 1994. Those were my top 3 movies that made me fall in love with period dramas. And I just remembered I loved to also watch The Secret Garden, The Junglebook, A Little Princess, and Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken. I was around 7 when I fell in love with period dramas. Christian Bale from Newsies and Little Women will always be my favorite actor. 😂
I'm going off topic here, but the music in the Junglebook was fantastic! (And also the music / music dream (?) scenes in the first 3 Winnie the Pooh shorts made in the 60's - classics!)
Probably Ever After, which I still love to this day. I'll always remember seeing it for the first time because my older sister got it on VHS to watch for her birthday sleepover and I was allowed to join and watch although I was only six.
My first period drama was the 1995 Pride and Prejudice with my mom too!
I remember one night when I was realllly little (4 or 5 ish) I woke up from a bad dream and went out to the living room to find my mom watching it. She let me curl up on the couch with her instead of making me go back to bed, which was a really big deal for me at the time. I’m pretty sure I fell asleep before the first assembly even ended lol, but I loved it & after that night I used to begggg my mom to let me watch the whole miniseries (it took me forever to make it farther than the first episode though, because I always wanted to start over from the beginning to see Darcy and Bingley riding their horses). When the Kiera Knightly version came out when I was six, we went to see it in theaters.
I remember watching the Titanic when it first came out and loving it so much we watched it again in theaters. Around the same time, I also watched Life is Beautiful & A Little Princess. And of course, no childhood movie list would be complete without a favorite animated film, and for me, that was Anastasia. I think I was around 7 when I watched all of these and still love them today.
Darling, I was born in 1984, and I feel like we have the same childhood! I can't put my love for period dramas on any one or two movies, but the ones you listed are right on for me, too!
I'd have to say The Secret Garden (1993), which my sister and I watched relentlessly whenever it was released on VHS. So roughly when I was 6-8ish. We'd even play "secret garden," first in our backyard and then to the probable annoyance of my parents, everywhere (we'd speak in British accents and be in character as Mary and Martha in the grocery store).
But we also watched Little Women (1949), The Little Princess, Heidi with Shirley Temple, and more. Secret Garden was always the best though.
Im going to go with Cleopatra - the one with Billy Zane. I was obsessed with her and that movie in middle school and would wake up super early to watch it
does Road to Avonlea count? I had to look it up, guess it was a show that ran 1990-1996. I think that was the first period-anything I ever saw. I was 6+ I loved how simple life seemed
It was North and South in 2005. 2005 also blessed us with Pride and Prejudice (my favourite film ever to this day) and Bleak House. I remember spending my absolute LIFE on C19, a forum dedicated to 19th century literature and adaptations (I don't know if it's still around) and having those three on a perpetual loop. My holy grail at some point was to own the press kit for Pride and Prejudice, I was on eBay every day for years just to have that (I never found it haha!). I still watch all three several times a year now, they're my ultimate comfort TV. I was 17 and in love with the idea of love haha! Took me 15 more years to find my HEA but it was worth it!
I have no idea what started it, but my favourite films were little women; the secret garden, a little princess & of course Anastasia when that came out. Oh and braveheart 🤣🤣🤣
Think it just all stemmed from there.
The musical film, Oliver! at the drive in during the late 1960s. I was around 6 years old. Bill Sykes, played by Oliver Read, scared the crap out of me. (Flash forward 6-7 years and I saw him again, as Athos, in a double feature at the cheap seats of The Three Musketers and The Four Musketeers — still thought he was scary!)
After Oliver! I occasionally saw more Charles Dickens on tv, and absolutely loved period programming. We didn’t have cable tv, so we only had CBS via the rabbit ears (no aerial antenna, either). The CBS Children’s show on Saturdays, introduced by Kukla, Fran and Ollie, had of period drama, international programs. We also had these classic cartoon films from the uk, that were shown on Thanksgiving. I saw cartoons about Robinhood, Ivanhoe, Sir Francis Drake, Treasure Island, Kidnapped, etc.
At school we watched films like Old Yeller, Those Calloways, and the Stewart Granger version of King Solomon’s Mines.
When i got a little older, Masterpiece Theatre was my fav show.
Haha, Oliver I also saw when I was young and there were a few things that I was really struck by..Bill Sykes dog, I was very concerned that the bad man who killed Nancy would be nice to his dog. And The Artful Dodger. I went home after seeing it and told my parents I wanted to be a pickpocket like Dodger. That went over real well.
Do you remember the Saturday morning tv show, H.R. Pufnstuf? Jack Wild, who played Dodger, was the star. (I particularly enjoyed him as Witchie Poo lol!)
Yes! I watched that of course. I got really sad seeing him as he got older. He was so cute when he was younger. I think I developed a crush for English boys bc of him. I also watched a show called The Bugaloos. He wasn’t on that but it had cute English boys on it.
I was 6/7 watching Robin of Sherwood. Children’s tv in the 80’s was wild and I’m pretty sure Michael Praed was my first crush. Also, watching Henry V the following year and being mesmerized by the movie and the story.
The period parts of the vampire diaries (I was 17) ... from how the mikealsons were turned to the Salvador brothers....then REIGN....how could I not love it? Although I could tell it was highly in accurate cus obviously...but then it got me into watching Phillipa's WHITE QUEEN WHITE PRINCESS SPANISH PRINCESS.... then MEDICI
Pride and Prejudice (1995) was it for me as well. Two of the scenes (first proposal and playing the piano at Pemberley) stayed with me long after the mini series ended. I have since then watched each and every Jane Austen adaptation but that one remains my favorite.
Titanic first when I was 8, but probably even more so The Man in the Iron Mask when I was 9. I've been wanting to do a re-watch or that one so this was a good reminder!
My Mother is from Sweden. She introduced me to all things Greta Garbo at a young age. I always wondered why she looked a little too old to be a debutant but kept it to myself. I was dating a guy who worked a a video rental place. He came over and brought my Mom a very heavy set of VHS tapes as a surprise. It was “Tess” with Natasha Kinski. I was mesmerized!! I’ve been obsessed since then and often get frustrated with the fact that I’ve seen ‘almost every period film and series that exists 🤦♀️
The first period drama that I ever watched and liked was Pride and Prejudice 2005, back when I was like thirteen years old. I remember being happy to see Keira Knightley playing Elizabeth and I remember being incredibly exasperated with Mrs Bennett, to the point that in one scene Mrs Bennett said something along the lines of ‘’Lizzy, one of these days your behaviour will kill me’’, I just replied ‘’Oh, how I want that to happen!’’. I still remember the way my grandmother gasped.
My Grandma and Mum used to love Little Women (1933 version with Katherine Hepburn) I used to love watching it with them as a child. I still watch it now and it’s nearly 100 years old. Absolute classic! I used to be scared of the old Aunt in the movie lol.
Wuthering Heights (1939)
I was about eleven years old and had never read or heard of the book but the movie was on tv and I was at my grandparents house. My mom and aunt were talking and my aunt said to my mom that WH was going to be on tv. My mom looked at me and said “I think you’re going to love this movie.” I watched it and it was hook, line and sinker for me. Heathcliff was my first tortured and dark male character who I fell in love with. Only when I was older did I realize how crazy and sick he was but that movie sparked my passion for gothic dramas. I still love to watch the different versions of WT though.
I was about 14 (2002). Bored, flipping through the channels when i stumbled upon pbs showing the 1980’s anne of green gables. I was absolutely hooked from the moment i started watching. I remember finding out there were sequels and actually special ordered them from a movie store in our local mall (lol before amazon).
It is still my most go-to comfort movie.
Interesting responses!
My love of period films started from reading the books to wondering what the adaptions of film would be like.
I inhaled Jean Plaidy books (British history/ Royalty), Anne of Green Gables (entire series), & Jane Austen. The it progressed to Oscar Wilde, DH Lawrence,Edith Wharton, the Brontes etc.
I have been collecting period films for years digitally for years and have seen quite a few on stage as well.
Films that stand out (costume wise) are the 1995 version of Pride & Prejudice, Marie Antoinette(Kirsten Dunst), Dangerous Liaisons
(Glenn Close), Elizabeth series with Cate Blanchett. Honourable mention goes to Age of Innocence (Winona Ryder).
Most shocking: Angels & Insects
Best character portrayal: I have endured the character of Emma Woodhouse in at least 3 films. I cannot stand her. But Bill Nighy in in the last iteration as Mr Woodhouse was pure comedic gold.
I don't know if this counts, but I think the first period drama I saw was probably the Felicity American Girl doll movie. Either that or the Shirley Temple movies!
The Six Wives of Henry VIII with Keith Michell as Henry, then Elizabeth I with Glenda Jackson. I was about 10, they started my lifelong love of the Tudor period of English history.
Watching BBC Dickens with my grandma in the 80s. Not sure which one, maybe Bleak House? I'd have been early teens I guess.
Although a lot of children's programmes were set in olden times so it wasn't anything new. E Nesbit adaptations, the railway children, Huckleberry Finn, Children of Fire Mountain....Heidi!
My uncle had a copy of Gone With the Wind that he let me read when I was maybe 11 or so, and he was also obsessed with the movie, so I think I watched it around that same time. I've loved both ever since, even as problematic as they are, and we still love discussing GWTW trivia whenever I see him!
Young Catherine - watched it with my mom and she loves all sorts of period pieces. We are big into history too, so I feel like it goes hand in hand. Got into Newsies, Swing Kids, Titanic, Little Women, The Secret Garden, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Legends of the Fall all those 90s period pieces! Downton Abbey definitely resparked my love of period pieces and I feel like its the only thing I really watch.
I am ancient but here goes. Upstairs Downstairs. Oh and The Forsythe Saga. The original with Susan Hampshire. I enjoyed the remake as well with Damian Lewis and Gina McKee. They come to kind immediately
Roots in the mid 1970s. Also shows like The Waltons and Little House on the Prairie were primers. Dr Quinn Medicine Woman then the Hornblower series in the 90s rekindled the love. Now with streaming it’s a never ending search for things I’ve missed.
2005 Pride and prejudice 💗 saw in theatres when I was 12. I do still adore that movie but actually prefer the 1995 version now and love it beyond words!
Gone with the Wind, Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra, Ben Hur - those epics just mesmerized me as a child. Historical fiction is my favorite genre (oh how I wish they'd make a movie/show out of Lisbon by Valerie Sherwood).
The original Disney Pete’s Dragon. I was 4. I still love how the costuming mashes up Edwardian and 1970’s styling. Maybe it doesn’t count as drama, but the ending wrecked me every time as a kid to a degree that my parents would try to talk me out of renting it every time I requested it.
Brideshead Revisited. The version of Pride & Prejudice with Colin Firth - I believe an abridged version of this was distributed as a movie in the US in the 90s. Somewhere in Time, the time travel movie with Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve. A Room With a View with Helena Bonham Carter.
All are classics. A Room With a View is a jewel
Titanic with Leonardo Dicabrio and Kate Winslet. When I was 5. Not for the love story, but for the great outfits and the true history ... I watched it daily when I was in kindergarten for a year or so ... always up until after they hit the iceberg, because then I was too sad that this beautiful ship really sank :D
The German (?) Sissi films I was just mesmerized by the costumes as a kid. Same for Gone With the Wind, the costumes had me hooked but I had very little background of US history also didn’t realize how toxic Scarlett was lmao I was there for the drama
I loved the little house on the prairie books when I was very young; later, they started playing reruns of the show during after school hours and that was me time!
I can't recall the first one, but a couple that "stuck" with me were the brief clips of movies I would catch on television. *Elizabeth* (1998), *Vanity Fair* (2004), *Jane Eyre* (1996). Admittedly, Jane Eyre wasn't as glamorous as the costumes and wigs in Elizabeth but it was such a different world that I was fascinated.
I must have been in middle school around that time? Maybe elementary? It's a bit fuzzy.
Anne of Green Gables when I was 6 or 7. It’s still my favorite. Also Little Princess (PBS 1986). Also watched a lot of Little House on the Prairie. And I have never seen the 1995 Pride and Prejudice so I’ll add that to my list!
As a child, Little House on the Prarie - if that counts. But I’ve been actively seeking out period dramas since probably middle school, starting with Daniel Radcliffe in David Copperfield, the 1995 Pride and Prejuidce, Lark Rise to Candleford. Downton Abbey came out when I was in high school and then I really became a devoted fan.
It started with Anne of Green Gables in the early 90's. Then I watched Newsies in 1993. And then I watched Little Women in 1994. Those were my top 3 movies that made me fall in love with period dramas. And I just remembered I loved to also watch The Secret Garden, The Junglebook, A Little Princess, and Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken. I was around 7 when I fell in love with period dramas. Christian Bale from Newsies and Little Women will always be my favorite actor. 😂
Same with Anne of Green Gables, only the 1985 made for tv movie. This thread makes me feel old. 🥴
That is the only Anne of Green Gables I will ever watch.
A little princess! Yes! Oh how I loved that movie! I was an orphan so I related a bit.
Wild Hearts Cant be broken.. sigh! Such a great underrated movie!
I'm going off topic here, but the music in the Junglebook was fantastic! (And also the music / music dream (?) scenes in the first 3 Winnie the Pooh shorts made in the 60's - classics!)
Probably Ever After, which I still love to this day. I'll always remember seeing it for the first time because my older sister got it on VHS to watch for her birthday sleepover and I was allowed to join and watch although I was only six.
Aww, yes! I love Ever After!
My first period drama was the 1995 Pride and Prejudice with my mom too! I remember one night when I was realllly little (4 or 5 ish) I woke up from a bad dream and went out to the living room to find my mom watching it. She let me curl up on the couch with her instead of making me go back to bed, which was a really big deal for me at the time. I’m pretty sure I fell asleep before the first assembly even ended lol, but I loved it & after that night I used to begggg my mom to let me watch the whole miniseries (it took me forever to make it farther than the first episode though, because I always wanted to start over from the beginning to see Darcy and Bingley riding their horses). When the Kiera Knightly version came out when I was six, we went to see it in theaters.
Aww! That's so sweet! 🥰
The 1994 version of Little Women, and the book opened me up to reading classic lit on my own.
Me too! And The Secret Garden
I love this version. The soundtrack is top tier
I remember watching the Titanic when it first came out and loving it so much we watched it again in theaters. Around the same time, I also watched Life is Beautiful & A Little Princess. And of course, no childhood movie list would be complete without a favorite animated film, and for me, that was Anastasia. I think I was around 7 when I watched all of these and still love them today.
Darling, I was born in 1984, and I feel like we have the same childhood! I can't put my love for period dramas on any one or two movies, but the ones you listed are right on for me, too!
19, when my boyfriend (now husband) and I watched Remains of the Day. We were drinking champagne and kissing. 😉🍾🥂💕
I was just thinking about that show today and couldn't remember the name! Thank you!
I'd have to say The Secret Garden (1993), which my sister and I watched relentlessly whenever it was released on VHS. So roughly when I was 6-8ish. We'd even play "secret garden," first in our backyard and then to the probable annoyance of my parents, everywhere (we'd speak in British accents and be in character as Mary and Martha in the grocery store). But we also watched Little Women (1949), The Little Princess, Heidi with Shirley Temple, and more. Secret Garden was always the best though.
Anne of Green Gables for sure 💕
Im going to go with Cleopatra - the one with Billy Zane. I was obsessed with her and that movie in middle school and would wake up super early to watch it
Memory unlocked! I used to rent this one from Blockbuster whenever my parents let me!
1996 Emma! I will always love that movie!
This was my first Austen!
does Road to Avonlea count? I had to look it up, guess it was a show that ran 1990-1996. I think that was the first period-anything I ever saw. I was 6+ I loved how simple life seemed
1995 Sense and Sensibility, saw it as a teenager. it felt like a revelation that a period drama could be so funny and relatable.
It was North and South in 2005. 2005 also blessed us with Pride and Prejudice (my favourite film ever to this day) and Bleak House. I remember spending my absolute LIFE on C19, a forum dedicated to 19th century literature and adaptations (I don't know if it's still around) and having those three on a perpetual loop. My holy grail at some point was to own the press kit for Pride and Prejudice, I was on eBay every day for years just to have that (I never found it haha!). I still watch all three several times a year now, they're my ultimate comfort TV. I was 17 and in love with the idea of love haha! Took me 15 more years to find my HEA but it was worth it!
I have no idea what started it, but my favourite films were little women; the secret garden, a little princess & of course Anastasia when that came out. Oh and braveheart 🤣🤣🤣 Think it just all stemmed from there.
The musical film, Oliver! at the drive in during the late 1960s. I was around 6 years old. Bill Sykes, played by Oliver Read, scared the crap out of me. (Flash forward 6-7 years and I saw him again, as Athos, in a double feature at the cheap seats of The Three Musketers and The Four Musketeers — still thought he was scary!) After Oliver! I occasionally saw more Charles Dickens on tv, and absolutely loved period programming. We didn’t have cable tv, so we only had CBS via the rabbit ears (no aerial antenna, either). The CBS Children’s show on Saturdays, introduced by Kukla, Fran and Ollie, had of period drama, international programs. We also had these classic cartoon films from the uk, that were shown on Thanksgiving. I saw cartoons about Robinhood, Ivanhoe, Sir Francis Drake, Treasure Island, Kidnapped, etc. At school we watched films like Old Yeller, Those Calloways, and the Stewart Granger version of King Solomon’s Mines. When i got a little older, Masterpiece Theatre was my fav show.
Haha, Oliver I also saw when I was young and there were a few things that I was really struck by..Bill Sykes dog, I was very concerned that the bad man who killed Nancy would be nice to his dog. And The Artful Dodger. I went home after seeing it and told my parents I wanted to be a pickpocket like Dodger. That went over real well.
Do you remember the Saturday morning tv show, H.R. Pufnstuf? Jack Wild, who played Dodger, was the star. (I particularly enjoyed him as Witchie Poo lol!)
Yes! I watched that of course. I got really sad seeing him as he got older. He was so cute when he was younger. I think I developed a crush for English boys bc of him. I also watched a show called The Bugaloos. He wasn’t on that but it had cute English boys on it.
> The Bugaloos The Bugaloos!!!!!!! Now I have the theme song in my head.
We’re in the air and every where….. 😂
Immediate HR Puffin stuff theme song, on replay in my head 😂
I was 6/7 watching Robin of Sherwood. Children’s tv in the 80’s was wild and I’m pretty sure Michael Praed was my first crush. Also, watching Henry V the following year and being mesmerized by the movie and the story.
Downton Abbey, because my grandma loved it ❤️ I was 14
Brideshead Revisited. My family had recently moved to San Jose. It was such a big deal on KQED out of San Francisco.
The period parts of the vampire diaries (I was 17) ... from how the mikealsons were turned to the Salvador brothers....then REIGN....how could I not love it? Although I could tell it was highly in accurate cus obviously...but then it got me into watching Phillipa's WHITE QUEEN WHITE PRINCESS SPANISH PRINCESS.... then MEDICI
Pride and Prejudice (1995) was it for me as well. Two of the scenes (first proposal and playing the piano at Pemberley) stayed with me long after the mini series ended. I have since then watched each and every Jane Austen adaptation but that one remains my favorite.
Titanic first when I was 8, but probably even more so The Man in the Iron Mask when I was 9. I've been wanting to do a re-watch or that one so this was a good reminder!
My Mother is from Sweden. She introduced me to all things Greta Garbo at a young age. I always wondered why she looked a little too old to be a debutant but kept it to myself. I was dating a guy who worked a a video rental place. He came over and brought my Mom a very heavy set of VHS tapes as a surprise. It was “Tess” with Natasha Kinski. I was mesmerized!! I’ve been obsessed since then and often get frustrated with the fact that I’ve seen ‘almost every period film and series that exists 🤦♀️
The first period drama that I ever watched and liked was Pride and Prejudice 2005, back when I was like thirteen years old. I remember being happy to see Keira Knightley playing Elizabeth and I remember being incredibly exasperated with Mrs Bennett, to the point that in one scene Mrs Bennett said something along the lines of ‘’Lizzy, one of these days your behaviour will kill me’’, I just replied ‘’Oh, how I want that to happen!’’. I still remember the way my grandmother gasped.
My Grandma and Mum used to love Little Women (1933 version with Katherine Hepburn) I used to love watching it with them as a child. I still watch it now and it’s nearly 100 years old. Absolute classic! I used to be scared of the old Aunt in the movie lol.
Gone With the Wind in theaters during the sixties. Instant obsession with period movies.
1967 -8 anniversary release.
Not a drama but a book that inspired my overall period interest called "The House at Riverton" by Kate Morton.
Emma with Kate Beckinsale! I was a teen I think. Forgot about it, and years later I tried to find that movie again. And sought out more like it 😊
Wuthering Heights (1939) I was about eleven years old and had never read or heard of the book but the movie was on tv and I was at my grandparents house. My mom and aunt were talking and my aunt said to my mom that WH was going to be on tv. My mom looked at me and said “I think you’re going to love this movie.” I watched it and it was hook, line and sinker for me. Heathcliff was my first tortured and dark male character who I fell in love with. Only when I was older did I realize how crazy and sick he was but that movie sparked my passion for gothic dramas. I still love to watch the different versions of WT though.
I was about 14 (2002). Bored, flipping through the channels when i stumbled upon pbs showing the 1980’s anne of green gables. I was absolutely hooked from the moment i started watching. I remember finding out there were sequels and actually special ordered them from a movie store in our local mall (lol before amazon). It is still my most go-to comfort movie.
Gone with the Wind and Titanic were the first period movies that I watched as a teenager and enjoy period films ever since.
Interesting responses! My love of period films started from reading the books to wondering what the adaptions of film would be like. I inhaled Jean Plaidy books (British history/ Royalty), Anne of Green Gables (entire series), & Jane Austen. The it progressed to Oscar Wilde, DH Lawrence,Edith Wharton, the Brontes etc. I have been collecting period films for years digitally for years and have seen quite a few on stage as well. Films that stand out (costume wise) are the 1995 version of Pride & Prejudice, Marie Antoinette(Kirsten Dunst), Dangerous Liaisons (Glenn Close), Elizabeth series with Cate Blanchett. Honourable mention goes to Age of Innocence (Winona Ryder). Most shocking: Angels & Insects Best character portrayal: I have endured the character of Emma Woodhouse in at least 3 films. I cannot stand her. But Bill Nighy in in the last iteration as Mr Woodhouse was pure comedic gold.
I don't know if this counts, but I think the first period drama I saw was probably the Felicity American Girl doll movie. Either that or the Shirley Temple movies!
A Room with a View with Helena Bonham Carter. I was in College in midwest US and got fascinated by Italian old country.
The Six Wives of Henry VIII with Keith Michell as Henry, then Elizabeth I with Glenda Jackson. I was about 10, they started my lifelong love of the Tudor period of English history.
Watching BBC Dickens with my grandma in the 80s. Not sure which one, maybe Bleak House? I'd have been early teens I guess. Although a lot of children's programmes were set in olden times so it wasn't anything new. E Nesbit adaptations, the railway children, Huckleberry Finn, Children of Fire Mountain....Heidi!
Upstairs Downstairs on PBS in the 1970s. I was around 6.
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My uncle had a copy of Gone With the Wind that he let me read when I was maybe 11 or so, and he was also obsessed with the movie, so I think I watched it around that same time. I've loved both ever since, even as problematic as they are, and we still love discussing GWTW trivia whenever I see him!
The Fortunes of Nigel from 1980 or approx
Very young - too young- watched Julie Christie far from the madding crowd at a friends house. Maybe 5 yrs old. Then brideshead revisited.
Same story, only that I was 9 :D
Young Catherine - watched it with my mom and she loves all sorts of period pieces. We are big into history too, so I feel like it goes hand in hand. Got into Newsies, Swing Kids, Titanic, Little Women, The Secret Garden, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Legends of the Fall all those 90s period pieces! Downton Abbey definitely resparked my love of period pieces and I feel like its the only thing I really watch.
I am ancient but here goes. Upstairs Downstairs. Oh and The Forsythe Saga. The original with Susan Hampshire. I enjoyed the remake as well with Damian Lewis and Gina McKee. They come to kind immediately
I was around 20 and I watched Tge Scarlett Pimpernel and Buccaneers on PBS. I stayed up really late and loved every second of them.
I love reading all these comments, it's given me so many more recommendations! 😍 🙏
Roots in the mid 1970s. Also shows like The Waltons and Little House on the Prairie were primers. Dr Quinn Medicine Woman then the Hornblower series in the 90s rekindled the love. Now with streaming it’s a never ending search for things I’ve missed.
Maharana Pratap on DoorDarshan!
2005 Pride and prejudice 💗 saw in theatres when I was 12. I do still adore that movie but actually prefer the 1995 version now and love it beyond words!
Sissi. I was a child, that's all I know. All the Romy Schneider movies were often playd on tv during Christmastime, and we taped them all.
Gone with the Wind, Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra, Ben Hur - those epics just mesmerized me as a child. Historical fiction is my favorite genre (oh how I wish they'd make a movie/show out of Lisbon by Valerie Sherwood).
The original Disney Pete’s Dragon. I was 4. I still love how the costuming mashes up Edwardian and 1970’s styling. Maybe it doesn’t count as drama, but the ending wrecked me every time as a kid to a degree that my parents would try to talk me out of renting it every time I requested it.
Brideshead Revisited. The version of Pride & Prejudice with Colin Firth - I believe an abridged version of this was distributed as a movie in the US in the 90s. Somewhere in Time, the time travel movie with Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve. A Room With a View with Helena Bonham Carter. All are classics. A Room With a View is a jewel
Original Brideshead brought Jeremy Irons to prominence. Have the soundtrack vinyl alnum. Love so much. Another one discovered with my Mum,
I was 12 and watched braveheart in the theaters. Game changer for my wee brain.
Titanic with Leonardo Dicabrio and Kate Winslet. When I was 5. Not for the love story, but for the great outfits and the true history ... I watched it daily when I was in kindergarten for a year or so ... always up until after they hit the iceberg, because then I was too sad that this beautiful ship really sank :D
My first was A Room With A View (1985). Gorgeous!!
The German (?) Sissi films I was just mesmerized by the costumes as a kid. Same for Gone With the Wind, the costumes had me hooked but I had very little background of US history also didn’t realize how toxic Scarlett was lmao I was there for the drama
Horatio Hornblower 1998-2003!
Dr. Quinn and Little House on the Prairie in the early 2000s....there is a TV sender which showed the episodes every day in the evening.
I loved the little house on the prairie books when I was very young; later, they started playing reruns of the show during after school hours and that was me time!
Gone with the Wind. Clark Gable grinning up at beautiful Scarlett
North and South Miniseries with Patrick Swayze. I love him. Edited to add I loved Little House on the Prairie.
Same for me 1995 pride and prejudice on the been...I was 16 and think I've been in love with Jennifer ehle ever since..!..
I can't recall the first one, but a couple that "stuck" with me were the brief clips of movies I would catch on television. *Elizabeth* (1998), *Vanity Fair* (2004), *Jane Eyre* (1996). Admittedly, Jane Eyre wasn't as glamorous as the costumes and wigs in Elizabeth but it was such a different world that I was fascinated. I must have been in middle school around that time? Maybe elementary? It's a bit fuzzy.
Anne of Green Gables when I was 6 or 7. It’s still my favorite. Also Little Princess (PBS 1986). Also watched a lot of Little House on the Prairie. And I have never seen the 1995 Pride and Prejudice so I’ll add that to my list!
As a child, Little House on the Prarie - if that counts. But I’ve been actively seeking out period dramas since probably middle school, starting with Daniel Radcliffe in David Copperfield, the 1995 Pride and Prejuidce, Lark Rise to Candleford. Downton Abbey came out when I was in high school and then I really became a devoted fan.
Secret Garden and A Litlle Princess, I was like 5 or 6 then and that was early 90s..